World News - U.S. Expects Security Council Agreement on Iran Sanctions Within Weeks. If that happens guess what will happen to the price of Gas

The United States expects a Security Council agreement on U.N. sanctions against Iran within weeks unless Tehran agrees at the last minute to freeze uranium enrichment, a senior State Department official said Friday. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns also dismissed suggestions of cracks in the six-power coalition pushing Tehran to give up enrichment. Speaking a day after those countries ended confidential discussions in Berlin, Burns said further talks were needed on how harshly to penalize Tehran for its refusal to freeze enrichment, as demanded by the Security Council. But he said a lot of progress was made. Outlining the U.S. view of the timetable on Iran in the coming weeks, Burns said the six nations would further consult by phone on Monday and hoped to present a unified approach on sanctions to their foreign ministers by the time the U.N. General Assembly opens Tuesday. ... http://abcnews.go.com

NASA scrubbed Friday's launch of the space shuttle Atlantis again, this time because of a problem that has bedeviled the space agency before: a faulty fuel tank sensor. The launch was rescheduled for 11:15 a.m. EDT on Saturday, when NASA will try a fifth time to get Atlantis off the ground and send it to the international space station to resume construction on the orbiting outpost, which has been on hold since the Columbia tragedy 3 1/2 years ago. Saturday is the last time NASA has to launch Atlantis before it has to go to the back of the line, behind a Russian Soyuz capsule that is slated for liftoff Sept. 18 on a flight to the space station. Both Atlantis and the Soyuz cannot be at the space station at the same time. If Atlantis cannot lift off on Saturday, it will have to wait at least until late September and even then, only if NASA waives a post-Sept. 11 rule that says launches must be conducted in daylight so that the spaceship can be photographed for signs of damage...http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=2410243

A suicide car bombing in Kabul has killed at least 16 people, as Nato military chiefs were set to discuss a plea for more troops for Afghanistan. The attack on a US military convoy occurred near the American embassy, killing two US soldiers and injuring two others, the US military said. It came hours before talks got under way in Poland, where Nato generals are expected to seek 2,000 more troops. Nato forces in the south face mounting casualties in clashes with the Taleban. The Kabul blast targeted a US military convoy hitting a Humvee, a military spokesman told the BBC. Local hospitals told the BBC nearly 30 people had been wounded. The BBC's Alastair Leithead at the scene said debris and body parts had been scattered over a wide area by the force of the blast, which was felt across the city. ...http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/5326060.stm

At least 30 people have been killed in two blasts at a Muslim graveyard in western India, police and medics say. More than 125 others were hurt in the explosions after Friday prayers in Malegaon. The hospital in the town says 20 of them are in a serious condition. State police chief PS Pasricha said a curfew had been imposed and police reinforcements sent to the town. It is not clear what caused the blasts as Muslims left prayers. The town has seen religious violence in the past. There were at least 29 bodies of people killed in the blasts at the Wadia hospital in Malegaon, its chief medical officer, LN Chauhan, told the BBC. He said his staff were treating more than 125 people for injuries, 20 of whom were in a serious condition. State officials have put the death toll at more than 30. ...http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/5326730.stm

A landslide buried buses and cars on a highway in the central state of Puebla and killed at least four travelers Thursday, a day after a separate avalanche left 10 villagers dead in northern Mexico.The Puebla landslide occurred on a highway between Mexico City and the city of Tuxpan in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz, covering with dirt and mud two tractor-trailers, two passenger buses, three public passenger vans and a car, Puebla state official Ismael Rios told Radio Formato 21. Four people died and at least 11 were injured, Puebla's interior secretary, Javier Lopez Avala, later told a news conference that was broadcast live on the radio.Dozens of rescuers and soldiers equipped with sniffer dogs tried to dig the vehicles out of the mud Thursday night. It was not clear if they expected to find more victims, or exactly what caused the landslide....http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/08/ap/world/mainD8K0EBRO0.shtml

The former No. 2 State Department official said Thursday he inadvertently disclosed the identity of CIA employee Valerie Plame in conversations with two reporters in 2003. Confirming that he was the source of a leak that triggered a federal investigation, former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said he never intended to reveal Plame’s identity. He apologized for his conversations with syndicated columnist Robert Novak and Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward. For almost three years, an investigation led by Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has tried to determine whether Bush administration officials intentionally revealed Plame’s identity as covert operative as a way to punish her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, for criticizing the Bush administration’s march to war with Iraq. “I made a terrible mistake, not maliciously, but I made a terrible mistake,” Armitage said in a telephone interview from his home Thursday night. ...http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14723718/